I just wanted to let every one know that the Suburban Aero Club will be having a day of Open Combat Competition on June 6th. If you find yourself in the Chicago Land area, why not drop on by. We do have a few different rules for the event by it mainly follows the AMA rules as listed for the event. One change is that just about any size plane or motor can be used, I think up to a .75 engine is OK. The other change is you should not count on getting streamer kills with your wings. We use a 2 inch wide crepe paper streamer with a 3/4 inch piece of masking tape going down the entire length. This is the only way we've found to keep the streamers from coming apart. You can go here to find out the location of our field.

http://www.sac-rc.org

John Boren

Why are your streamers coming apart? You should try the streamers that HatTrick sells, they never come apart on me unless they get wet. you can find him at rccombat.com

Getting wet is one way the streamers come apart but just the speed of the planes does the rest. Even with the tape we loose a foot or two during a match. Maybe thinner streamers would help but I'm not the contest CD. I will pass the URL link to the CD and Let him decide.

John Boren

Below are the official rules for the event.

RULES
Engine size is limited to a maximum size of .75
And 8lbs weight, No open exhausts, any type of aircraft is acceptable
Maximum of six planes in the air per round
Five minute matches
One point for each second of air time
For a maximum of 300 pts
300 points per cut awarded to flier making cut
2 points for every foot of streamer left
60 points max awarded
10 pts Spot Landing

John,

I typically have the fastest combat planes on the circuit 90+mph I would guess, as the Jett 30's have been my engine of choice last 3 years, on 3 lb carbon fiber planes with low drag. All this to say that the Dennecrepe works fine. the tail does shorten a bit in length but not that much. I would suggest the Forestry tape over taping dime store crepe. Forestry tape is used in the rain and breaks easier than surveyor plastic tape which I despise. I'm from Chicago area and just may put my 60MPH .15 size SSC up against the .75's if I'm in town, say high to Al Meyers for me,

C/F make sure there is a video camera running. I want to see your 3 lb. CF combt plane flying completely thru one of the 8 lb. flying pigs

That should be something to see.[X(]

c/f we need to race our combat planes at the next meet Now I gotta know who's is faster

I say mines faster then yours.

John Boren

Hey C/F,

If you're coming as far as Chicago you're only a few more hours away from attending a combat meet we've got going on the same weekend. C'mon up to Wild Wings Over Wisconsin! It's shaping up to be a great contest and we'd be happy to fly with you. You can test yourself against the best pilots in the north and get NPS points for it too!

I'm impressed that their club has enough room for a 375' engagement line. We'd be out in the weeds at our field.

By the way, my buddy Steve's Jett powered choker has been clocked repeatedly with a quality gun at around 120 mph. Steve is flying a shorter wing with less drag but I think your 90 mph estimate is conservative.

Awwww man I wished I could make this contest!
Now this is what I call SSC combat! Super Sonic Combat
I hope you guys get some video and post it online!

You would notice very little difference from any other Open B contest. Steve's choker with a .25FX on Ultrathrust will push 100 mph. My choker, with 64" ripstop covered wings and .25/ Ultrathrust was in the the low to mid 80's. I think most every Open B ship is flying at or near the 80-85 mph mark. More than likely you won't see the Jett powered choker fly in our contest. While speed is nice to have, the shorter wing gives up turning ability and streamer grabbing potential. I would rather have the longer wing, better turning, slower ship any day.

It sure is fun to rip around with the 120mph choker though!

My experience has been that faster planes are frequently at a major disadvantage in combat unless the pilot is really good at using the speed and avoiding the situations where it works against them.

Basically in one-on-one, speed is nice. In a 6+ plane heat, it's better to be going the same speed as most of the rest of the planes. If you're roaring around at mach3, someone else is busily running around at 80mph gathering up everyone else's streamer while you're still trying to get turned around and back to the furball .